Former WCHV radio personality Joe Thomas and his wife Elaine bought Staunton’s WTON-AM 1240 radio in April and are reformatting it to be a local news and talk station that will include coverage of Crozet. The deal for $275,000 gave Thomas Media LLC possession of the station on May 24. The couple has additional investors.
The station dates to 1942 and its offices remain in their original location on Beverley Street and include both AM and FM studios. The deal includes two other FM translators, 98.9 in Harrisonburg and 101.1 in Crozet, which will carry the same WTON programming.
Last November, Stu-Comm Inc. of Charlottesville, which operates WNRN, a non-profit independent music station, bought WTON-AM 1240 and FM 94.3 in order to boost WNRN’s presence in the Valley. But they were really only interested in the FM signal, Thomas explained, and they sold the rest.
“We’re calling it ‘The New WTON’ for a while because we added the two other stations,” he said. While talk radio, including national shows such as Dan Bongino’s and Lars Larson’s, are the staples of daytime, Thomas said he wants to develop local programming; for example, one possibility is a show featuring local farmers.
Thomas, who has the title Chief Operating Officer and Program Manager, said he’s hiring a news director and a sales manager, and they will hire more help. “We’re looking for reporters coming out of JMU,” he said, to staff a newsroom.
“We’re starting to find out where the audience is. We have no real idea. The consumer of radio news is generally politically more conservative. But I’m open to everybody. I’d love to hear Ann Mallek, if she wanted to do something. The goal is more local news. There’s a fear in the Valley of becoming Charlottesville-ized,” he said to give an example of a theme he expects to cover.
“I’m friends with [local Democrats] Ann Mallek and Dave Norris and Ned Gallaway. I’m not pulling any punches on the Republicans.”
Beginning his career at stations in New York state, Thomas spent 17 years at WCHV and offered to run his new stations in conjunction with WCHV. But instead, seeing a conflict in the idea, WCHV laid off Thomas at Easter. “We parted ways after they declined my offer to work together,” said Thomas.
“We consider western Albemarle and northern Nelson—Rt. 151—to be part of our beat. Growth is a big issue. It doesn’t pay for itself. Nelson is getting trampled right now.” Thomas said the intended coverage area extends “from the West Virginia line to Ivy.” He expects to do some local high school sports coverage, too, but those plans are vague as yet.
As for the business side, “We want to help anybody bring people into their businesses. People have to know what’s out there. We hope to get some revenues pretty quickly. We’ll need stringers (freelancers) and listeners to pitch in.”
“I think it’s going to fun. And I think local radio is the future. Small businesses need to stand up against the big franchises.”
